A "Tone-Deaf" Obama Mocked By The NYT For Vacationing While The World Burns

When it comes to mocking president Obama, there is no easier or more effective way than focusing on his vacation/golfing schedule. The conservative Washington Examiner did just that last week, before the latest Malaysian Airlines disaster, when it reported that "It's going to be hot tubs, basketball, tennis and golf for the first family this summer, having set plans for a 16-day vacation in Martha's Vineyard, Mass., on a $12 million, 10-acre forested estate on the southwestern corner of the island.

Reports from the Bay State indicate that President Obama and his family will vacation August 9-24 at the 8,100-square foot, beachfront home of a Democratic donor that includes a pool, hot tub, basketball and tennis court. It will be new digs for the first family, who have summered on tony Martha's Vineyard every year of Obama's presidency, except in 2012 when he was running for reelection. The Vineyard Gazette reported that the White House has no major or public events planned for the almost three weeks, typical at this stage of a presidential vacation.

That and golf of course.

However, all of that is to be expected, and sure enough, Obama can and will parry such mockery as political attacks coming from the right, while remarking how strong the US economy has become under his watch, how many millions of waiters and bartenders thousands of manufacturing jobs he has created, and of course, how the stock market hits a record high now on a daily basis.

Things get dicier, however, when Obama is mocked and virtually attacked for his vacation plans by none other than that flag-bearer of leftist ideology, the New York Times itself. Which is precisely what just happened in "Sticking to His Travel Plans, at Risk of Looking Bad"

As smoke billowed from the downed Malaysian jetliner in the fields of eastern Ukraine on Thursday, President Obama pressed ahead with his schedule: a cheeseburger with fries at the Charcoal Pit in Delaware, a speech about infrastructure and two splashy fund-raisers in New York City.

The potential for jarring split-screen imagery was clear. Reports of charred bodies and a ground-to-air missile attack from Eastern Europe dominated television screens while photographers snapped pictures of a grinning Mr. Obama holding a toddler at the restaurant. The presidential motorcade was later filmed pulling up to Trump Place Apartments, the Riverside Avenue venue for his first fund-raiser.

And yet, White House aides said no consideration was given to abandoning the president’s long-planned schedule, even during the hourlong flight from Delaware to New York, when word suddenly arrived that Israel had begun a ground invasion of the Gaza Strip, providing the day’s second international challenge.

Instead, White House officials simply made sure to describe the president’s on-the-road management of the crises: calls to world leaders from Air Force One, telephone briefings from Secretary of State John Kerry and a secure-line meeting of his national security staff from a room in the Trump Place Apartments before his fund-raiser.

“It is rarely a good idea to return to the White House just for show, when the situation can be handled responsibly from the road,” said Jennifer Palmieri, the White House communications director. “Abrupt changes to his schedule can have the unintended consequence of unduly alarming the American people or creating a false sense of crisis.”

Actually, that is somewhat correct: it has gotten to the point where seeing Obama actually work in the White House, instead of golfing of shaking hand with the same Wall Street bankers his DOJ pretends to prosecute, would create a "sense of crisis" among the American people. Not so sure about be "false" part.

And this is where things got rough:

For an administration in its sixth year, juggling presidential optics is nothing new. And with some rare exceptions, the public relations team around the president has remained consistently stubborn about refusing to let the never-ending stream of political, economic or international crises affect Mr. Obama’s daily schedule.

The current myriad incidents are no exceptions: Moments after making a grim statement about Ukraine on Friday, the president popped into the East Room, where the first lady, Michelle Obama, was holding a mock state dinner for children to promote her Let’s Move nutrition initiative. “My big thing,” he confessed to the kids, “chips and guacamole!” There was plenty of laughter all around.

To be sure, conservatives promptly ridiculed the president for what he does best: put on a great show before the teleprompter then quietly disappear in the golf cart. As noted above, this is nothing new and the administration felt no need to defend itself.

“Instead of responding to multiple international crises, the president apparently thought it was a better use of his time to attend a set of fund-raisers in New York,” Representative Kevin McCarthy, Republican of California and the incoming majority leader, said in a statement. “While the president is out on the loose and having a good time, he should remember that his responsibilities as commander in chief don’t stop when he’s out of the office.”

However, by now even the ubiquotous social media is starting not only to noticed, but to comment:

Administration officials shrug off that kind of organized Republican criticism. But social media users noticed, too. Twitter was filled with snarky mentions of the president’s activities on Thursday. One noted that Mr. Obama “interrupts busy fund-raising night to check in with team on two crises. Then back to business.” Another wrote: “Nice he could take a moment to check on those meddling world events.”

Obama won't be the first president to see his reputation tarnished by his vacation plans:

Veterans of previous administrations recalled that the political damage could be serious if the American people concluded that the president was politically tone deaf or insensitive, especially to the suffering of others during an emergency.

Scott McClellan, who served as George W. Bush’s press secretary during Hurricane Katrina, recalled that Mr. Bush, on a trip through Western states, was photographed strumming a guitar with a country music artist even as the storm began to bear down on New Orleans, flooding streets and stranding residents.

“When those moments are placed side by side with a crisis that’s worsening, it creates a perception problem that the White House can’t ignore,” Mr. McClellan said in an interview.

In his book “What Happened,” Mr. McClellan recalls with horror seeing the “image of a seemingly carefree President Bush pursuing his original schedule and disregarding the plight of Katrina’s victims — the dead, the homeless, the lost.”

Later, Mr. McClellan writes: “With 20/20 hindsight, it’s clear that President Bush should have canceled his two-day western trip and headed back to Washington on Saturday or Sunday, before Katrina unleashed its fury.”

The NYT's punchline:

“There is a total lack of symmetry from what the American people are seeing from the president and what is going on in the world,” Mr. Schmidt said. He acknowledged that no president should be captive to events or hunkered down in the White House. And he said presidents, like other people, deserved downtime. But he said White House occupants had to abandon those moments when the situation demanded.

Will this time be any different for the tone deaf president, and will the first observation of Obama's vacationeering by a liberal outlet force him to change his ways? Or does the world have to finally succumb to at least one mushroom cloud beside the countless fires raging across the globe, before someone in the White House notices? We should find out... but not before Obama comes back from Martha's Vineyard on August 24. Let's just hope that no major wars break out over the next month.

Good to know. I will definitely be reading that. I like the articles on your blog because they assemble a lot of detailed research I'm generally too lazy/busy to dig up myself. Keep up the awesome work.

Well, corporate execs hatch out all their little plots and deals on the golf course. Maybe Obomber is simply doing in Rome what the Romans do. Afterall, he has to get them to give hom a job when he's done destroying Amercia.

I could be wrong but the SAM is a surface to air missile rather than the Uncle Sam that usually has to do with taxes. Kinda like in Ukraine. Keep up with current events even though I understand how taxes are probably a bigger concern for you.

All part of the same shitshow that we've seen played out since time immemorial. The inevitable political tossing under the bus. In the olden days one was tossed beneath the horse drawn carriage and before that you were tossed beneath the wheels of the chariot. Pretty soon NYT will be endorsing Hillary and the play begins anew.

"The farmer imagines power and place are fine things. But the President has paid dear for his White House. It has commonly cost him all his peace, and the best of his manly attributes. To preserve for a short time so conspicuous an appearance before the world, he is content to eat dust before the real masters who stand erect behind the throne."

“Prudence itself is at her wits’ end. Pride, and Thrift, & Expediency, who jeered and chirped and was so well pleased with themselves and made merry with the dream as they termed it of philosophy & love: Behold they are all flat and here is the Soul direct and Unconquered still. What answer is it now to say—it has always been so.—I acknowledge that as far back as I can see the winding procession of humanity the marchers are lame & blind & deaf; but, to the soul, that whole past is but the finite series in its infinite scope. Deteriorating ever and now desperate. Let me begin anew. Let me teach the finite to know its Master. Let me ascend above my fate and work down upon my world." - Ralph Waldo Emerson

Some men are called on to rise above their petty selves & their times. Other men are called on to go golfing while working to down the world they find themself in.

I do not believe in this religion stuff. BUT GOOD LORD we (the unwashed masses) are in deep shite. The sheer audacity of calling the majority of the world incapable of thinking and doing so with such lack of ???? I am at a loss.

this gets more and more and more unbelieveable by the second. WTF? How stupid do these people think we are? And how desperate are they to stop all this info/opinion sharing?

If you mean the people on this board, this does not represent the average of the nation.

The average person in the country is probably paying little enough attention to what is really going on that it doesn't matter whether they are stupid or just disengaged. The effect is the same. The elites can continue their games either way.

Until the majority reacts with horror to the propaganda that is currently deemed "normal" spewing out of CNN / FOX / etc. in all the public places you are likely to find yourself, we are not there yet for doing anything about it.

Will this time be any different for the tone deaf president, and will the first observation of Obama's vacationeering by a liberal outlet force him to change his ways? Or does the world have to finally succumb to at least one mushroom cloud beside the countless fires raging across the globe, before someone in the White House notices? We should find out... but not before Obama comes back from Martha's Vineyard on August 24. Let's just hope that no major wars break out over the next month.

Good question. But becoming less relevant by the second. Question assumes that he gives a damn. Question assumes that White House is more that just a "Disneyland front". Question assumes that Pres actually has any power of any kind. Question assume morality. Question assumes some remaining trust.

I beg to differ with this article. He is not on vacation. He is working at the only job he has ever had -- fundraising from and glad handing the guys who run this joint. It's when he's sitting in the Oval office with some time to himself that he's on vacation.

You forgot the "exercises" to keep his lips and chocolate aperture limbered up for the banksters.

I have the CNN propaganda channel on in the background......the utter pandering to raise emotions against Russia is utterly absurd. One family member after another...the anchor chokes up....move on to the next victim relative.....it is revealing there is no reporting at all here, just propagandistic manipulation.

I was flying this weekend. I noticed this as well. But it's not utterly absurd. It's deadly serious. The only question is whether they can convince the population to go along. They keep throwing this shit out there and hoping something will stick. I only hope awareness has risen enough that we continue to stuff them back in their holes. Remember that they had to back off on direct action in Syria. They aren't able to count on the population in quite the facile way they once did. It's a thin reed, but it's what we have.

No, this POTUS has done the worst job ever. There- fixed it for you. This cocksucker could have used his bully pulpit to ' executive decree' that we would marshall national resources to cure Cancer. Or Alzheimers. Or Diabetes. Or anything. But no- we get NOTHING for our tax dollars except MORE graft, ineptitude, war and corruption. Oh, yeah- and all of your phone calls and e-mails are recorded. This asswipe even make Jimmy Carter look intelligent. And all of the unquestioning, mindless Democratic sycophants and NWO taint-lickers still pretend that The Lady Of The Lake just handed him Excalibur. Idiots.

I can't believe this piece came from the NYT. Everything else including Obama is more than believable. In fact he told everyone prior to his election about the transformation he would do to America. Dinesh D'Souza predicted how things would play out very accurately in his first documentary about this man..

Who really gives a fuck what this engineered puppet monkey does any more? I get a sick feeling that it is more than most of us that still have functioning cerebral cortex's would like to believe. And that is the problem; the puppet masters have enough of us figured out that it does not really matter anymore. The next POTUS could be a lobotomized, homosexual, communist, one-legged Japanese hooker named Irene, and it will be business as usual, the masses will think exactly what they are programmed to think.

His handlers are no doubt satisfied with the way things are going and would rather the idiot was out the way on vacation somewhere. What the world thinks of him is largely irrelevant, he's been elected twice now and another dud will be needed to replace him next time. It doesn't matter which of the turkeys currently lined up fill his vacancy. It really makes no differance what peoples opinions are in the U.S. or elsewhere, regarding whoever the figure head is that people are focusing their emotions on.

Bush 'vacationed' at his home in Crawford which was set up as a oval office south edition. He didn't putz around the Hamptons sucking big money cock or laugh away as Rome burned like the current dildo in the oval office.

Which reminds me, where the FUCK IS CINDY SHEEHAN or whatever the fuck her name was, that was down there protesting the war. Did she die, or is it the typical liberal bullshit that now that her guy is in the office we can kill as many fucking people as we want and drone the shit out of innocents and IT IS ALL OK.

So why not just mount the Teleprompter and a GoPro right on the golf cart and then he would never even have to leave the course- just grab another hotdog and a couple more Zima's as he rounded the turn?!? C'mon, Jimmy Kimmel- get the fuck ON that schtick!!